Africa's top adventure: the Selinda Canoe Trail

Luxury camps and lodges often have the best guides, best food and best locations in Africa this is why even if you arent bothered about the wonderful comforts these camps provide, they do provide a better safari experience when it comes to the quality of your game viewing and guiding. The best parts of Africa are undoubtedly the most remote, these wild and raw locations often take a while to reach but the vast wilderness you end up in is worth every minute spent travelling to get there. Most top end safari camps will offer something more than just game drives, such as walks and night drives, so your stay will always be an off the beaten track exploration, but we always think it pays to have a real adventure to combine with your ultra luxurious lodge or camp, and there is no better African adventure than the Selinda Canoe Trail.

The Selinda Canoe Trail is Botswanas (and Africas) most exciting and unique safari out there today. This three night tranquil meander down the Selinda Spillway offers an unparalleled opportunity to really let Africa get under your skin, to feel as if you are part of it, and it is part of you. With expert guiding from the Great Plains team you will glide quietly down this remote spillway taking in everything from exquisite bird life, to elephants playing happily on the banks. You will not see another soul.

In 2009 thanks to epic flood waters the Selinda Spillway (located in the Great Plains Conservation Selinda Reserve) began to flow for the first time in nearly three decades. Luckily the team at Great Plains are of an enquiring mind and knew this spillway just had to be explored. Every year since 2009 their expert guides have taken guests along this wonderful spillway, allowing only eight guests per departure (or bookable privately), and combining walking safaris with the canoes, ending with gourmet cuisine at the fly camp, which is set up in a different location each day while you are out on safari.

Nothing is planned on the Selinda Canoe Trail and it is the freedom and spontaneity of this that really allows you to escape from reality and let Africas sights and sounds engulf you. The Selinda Canoe Trail is not strenuous or only for those that are fit, it helps if you have a little balance but within an hour on the canoe you feel so comfortable and safe that you dont think about it again. After this magical safari youll be met on the shores of the spillway and catch your connecting flight to your next camp, or be further spoilt by the heavenly camps that are Selinda and Zarafa, based on the Selinda Reserve.